246 HOME AND GARDEN 



within sight for road-mending, and it was not 

 difficult to find one that could be so used with a 

 sort of sawing action, the stem meanwhile pressed 

 against another flint of rounded form, as would 

 compel the Succory plant to give up its flowers. 



The French have long cultivated a strong form 

 of the common Dandelion, a winter salad that should 

 be more generally cultivated, for it is quite excellent 

 and very wholesome, and nothing can be easier to 

 grow. It should be sown in April in an open trench ; 

 by the time the nights are getting frosty in late 

 autumn it should be earthed up, earthing a little 

 higher as the tips of the leaves come through. A 

 good line of it gives an abundant supply throughout 

 the winter. All the late summer I have been watch- 

 ing the development of one Avild Dandelion in a part 

 of my pleasure garden. It showed such a great 

 breadth of leaf and such unusual vigour that I am 

 keeping it to try for salad. As soon as the seed is 

 ripe, which will be about the end of next April, I 

 shall sow a line, and if it fulfils its early promise it 

 will be quite as good as any that I can buy. 



I sometimes eat a salad of quite wild Dandelion 

 in March ; for convenience of carrying cutting up 

 the whole plants, just under the top of the root- 

 stock. To avoid the greater part of the bitter taste, 

 which is in the juice of the mid-rib, the green part 

 is torn off and makes the salad. Dandelion is 

 Taraxacum, whose tonic properties are well known. 



